Played some practice combat rounds for our first Mutants and Masterminds game last night after making up PCs.

Two of us at the table were old hands a HERO and wow, I was surprised at how different it felt. Not bad, not good, but different.

How?

Combat was lightning fast. Luckily my group does pretty well at in-head basic math, so while that took some getting used to, having to do 8+15-9 did not slow the game down.

In the space of an hour we ran two combats with 4-5 combatants on a side. That would be a record in CHAMPIONS!

In the first fight we took on 4 PL 10-11 villains (vs. 4 PCs). At the end of the fight one of the heroes was KOed (ME!) and all of the villains were out. We had the drop on them, so that was about what everyone expected for an outcome. I felt like a dope when I laid unconscious for two rounds, until I was reminded by one of the players that I could have expended a Hero Point to re-roll OR expended a point to try and recover...

The second fight we fought three PL 10-11s and one PL 15. This one should have gone much differently, but, by now the Players had started using Hero Points to stay in the fight, but the GM, burdened with new rules and soo many options, did not use Villain Points. So, one lucky area effect energy blast later, two of the PL10 villains were KOed in the first round (he rolled 1's on both damage saves -- they missed the mark by a mile). Ouch.

In general the outcome of any one attack seemed extremely variable. CHAMPIONS is almost always a game of attrition. In M&M it seems like anything can happen. Partially, I think that is due to the d20 vs. 3d6. Rolling bad on your saves can just suck. I understand why Hero Point and Villain Points are an intrinsic part of the game mechanic to blunt those wild swings of luck.

I was expecting folks to take a lot of Hits. No one ever took more that 1 or, rarely, 2 Hits before being KOed. I can understand why Protection is so valued. Not having to roll against weak attacks is a real boon, when you have a pretty good chance of taking a carpet nap from some "minor" attack.

So, we have some rules to look over and we are going to try again in a week.

I have found the "lethality" of M&M a bit to high for my supers taste. I tend to use a DC 10 Base instead of DC 15 Base for damage saves and combats last a bit longer. I like it when tension builds up a bit more instead of having a HS moment every single time you take a hit.